Prom 2: The Mastersingers of Nuremberg

Presented as a "concert staging" of surprising austerity, Welsh National Opera's Prom performance of Mastersingers effectively formed the final leg of the production's opening tour. The audience found themselves faced with a more sober experience than anticipated.

The Proms

Until
11 September

bbc.co.uk/proms

Some of it had the untheatrical feel of a straightforward concert, albeit sung without scores. Yet this was also a performance of great richness, given by a fine if variable ensemble cast that was scrupulously attuned to the work's emotional dynamics.

Bryn Terfel's Sachs, inevitably, was allowed to dominate. It's his finest Wagner role to date. There are no questions here about stamina, as were raised after his controversial Wotan. And his extrovert way with the text precluded those moments of liederesque introversion that have intruded on his Wagner in the past. He's wonderful at suggesting the seriousness that lurks inside Sachs, and entirely credible as a man whose awareness of encroaching age is heightened by the youthfulness of others.

The complexity of Terfel's characterisation was more than matched by Christopher Purves's funny if unpleasant Beckmesser and Brindley Sherratt's Pogner. Less effective were Amanda Roocroft's vocally pressured Eva and Raymond Very's prosaic Walther. Lothar Koenigs conducted it as if it were a chamber work of vast proportions, though some of the detail was swallowed by the Albert Hall's foggy acoustic. The choral singing was sensational.